Community Correspondents

Madhuri Chauhan

Madhuri Chauhan- Uttar Pradesh
Madhuri Chauhan primarily reports on issues related to gender, women’s rights, and government programmes.
Madhuri Chauhan has been a leader since a young age. When her father died, her mother faced stigma, thanks to superstitious beliefs that she had caused the death. As her mother struggled, Madhuri found ways to support the family. She completed her education and became a teacher, despite the discrimination she faced because she was a girl. Her success made her a role model for other girls, and she quickly became the community’s leading activist for women’s rights. She reports for VV with the aim to do away with superstitions and discrimination. Madhuri believes that the media cannot always glorify the government. She has used journalism to reveal areas in which the government has failed to implement social welfare programmes. Her reporting is pioneering a new field for her fellow community members: social-impact, citizen-based journalism. She hopes to encourage others to change regressive cultural norms and systems through community media.
About the Partnership: The Poorest Areas Civil Society (PACS) Programme and Video Volunteers have come together to create the Community Correspondents Network. The videos generated by the network will be able to highlight voices from the margins, providing skills to social communicators to provide advocacy tools to community based organizations.

February 16; Khushinagar, UP Suman, along with her three sisters, had to leave her house following the financial constraints after her mother’s demise. “I collected the body and cremated her,” Suman, who is in her teens, told Community Correspondent Madhuri Chauhan. Since their father had already passed away, the four...

Community Correspondent Madhuri asks Sindhu, Gayatri Devi, Rita Devi and Srisati Devi the names of their husband. The women, of varying age, all smile shyly and unanimously respond that they cannot refer to their husbands by their names. The reason being the husband is a superior creature, equivalent to a...

Community Correspondent Madhuri asks Sindhu, Gayatri Devi, Rita Devi and Srisati Devi the names of their husband. The women, of varying age, all smile shyly and unanimously respond that they cannot refer to their husbands by their names. The reason being the husband is a superior creature, equivalent to a...

It’s been close to 13 years since Ashpati Devi has lost her husband but nobody would let her move on. She is barred from attending festivities and is blamed for her husband’s death to date. She is unwelcome in community spaces so much so that “people don’t want to see...

“I want to be able to go out and work too. Purdah and other such practices should end”, says a woman who has been forced to don the veil in her marital home poignantly. “Why is it that men are not forced to wear the veil our?” asks our Community...

Chakpihani village, Sant Kabir Nagar District, Uttar Pradesh | Madhuri Chauhan Flood after flood has washed away this community’s trust in local governance. This video report was made in 2013 by correspondent Madhuri, just after floods affected 20 districts in the state. Residents of Chakpihani never saw the compensation they...

16 March 2015 | Chaurakhas, Kusinagar, Uttar Pradesh | Madhuri Chauhan 40 days and on, the community waits to receive any work under MGNREGA. To keep the household running gradually becomes more and more difficult as more days pass.